


Eighteen Years

by Glory



Category: Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-04
Updated: 2013-01-04
Packaged: 2017-11-23 16:21:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,632
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/624153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Glory/pseuds/Glory
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A lot of things can change in eighteen years. But some things never do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Eighteen Years

It is surprisingly easy to fake your death.

That is, it is surprisingly easy to fake your death when you have renewed the acquaintance of a former Antivan Crow who never really liked you anyway.

The road he walked was one he had traveled down every year for the last 15 years.

The first time was an accident, really. A king who needed to get away from fawning scyophants and scheming politicians, he had realized he was surprisingly close to Orzammar and slipped away from camp. Just for a bit.

When you weren’t wearing the royal armor, no one really looked at you closely anyway.

The road brought back memories. Some good. Most not.

When he looked around him and truly took in where he was, he had quickly looked for landmarks. There! There was the place Old Tegrin often made camp. Where they would slip off the road and gather together to discuss their next insurmountable task.

He supposed it truly wasn’t insurmountable anyway. Not in the end.

He pushed back over-grown branches and looked up at the sky to get his bearings. No one used this abandoned camp ground anymore. Good.

As his gaze wandered over the campsite, his memories replaced the cold, empty fire-pit with a roaring blaze. There was where he would set up his tents, yes, and Wynne would have been over there.

Long strides took him to the spot. _The_ spot. Where he had given her a rose.  It was three years ago now. He had been king, by her doing, for three years. Anora was a kind queen, a just queen, and she had given him a son and a daughter who would grow up to rule just as fairly. But she was not _her_.

The first time he found the campsite it was an accident. Memories washed over him while the moonlight glinted off his armor and he remembered the way he had approached her. Held out the rose with pink cheeks, and a hopeful grin that was covering up the fact that he was absolutely terrified she would tell him he had made it all up in his head.

Instead she had plucked the rose gingerly from his hands, and thanked him. It was the first time he remembered her not being in control, not being _The Warden_. He had ducked his head and smiled at her, confessing his feelings. _I feel the same way,_ she had said.

Three years could change a lot of things.

Fifteen years ago he had found this campsite again. Completely by accident. Had remembered how much he had loved that woman. Wished fervently on the stars that he could see her face once more.

And she had appeared.

It was a fortnight before Feastday. The hunt was supposed to be relaxing. It was not. He didn’t realize it until he found the campsite. He didn’t realize he was moody and irrational because he was traveling the same path that led to _her._

When she stepped into the clearing, steps silent as ever, movement lithe and graceful, he drew in so much air he started coughing.

She looked up at the sound, bow already swinging around in front of her, before she saw him. Before she _saw_ him. With a thunk, the bow dropped to the ground. Unconciously, she took a step forward before stopping herself.

He was still coughing, still staring, when a grin split her face and she started moving again. “Oh, _Alistair_. You haven’t changed a bit.”

She hit him hard on the back to help him breathe again, but he couldn’t. Not when she was standing there looking like some sort of vision or dream or – or _nightmare_. How could he breathe?

Alistair – _King Alistair –_ stared at her for a few moments more before he spoke. “You’re here.”

She quirked an eyebrow, “Observant as always, milord.” Her voice was teasing. It was… comforting. He could have wept.

“ _What_ are you doing here?” he clarified.

“Hunting. I had heard some of my people were nearby. I was visiting.” A pause. “You look well, Alistair.”

He wanted to scream. To cry. To shout to the moon and stars that he was _not_ well. He was miserable. Plagued by nightmares only she could understand. Replaying a conversation in his head over and over again that he could never change. He was _not_ well.

“As do you,” was all that came out.

They spent breaths, moments, eons staring at one another before she finally huffed out an annoyed breath.

“How’s Anora?”

And there it was. There it sodding was. She wanted to talk about it, did she? She wanted what from him exactly? To hear he was happy? To hear about how he had sired two children on Anora while pretending it was _her_.

“She is well. We – have a son.”

“A son? That’s… incredible, Alistair.”

“He’s three.” Why was he talking? Why couldn’t he think of anything else to say? He was terrible at this.

“Three,” she repeated.

And then he couldn’t take it anymore, could not for one second hold it in any longer. “Maker’s breath, I miss you. I can’t do this. I can’t live this life without you. I thought I could, but I can’t. Seeing you here. I love you…”

“ _Alistair._ Please.” Her voice was low, anguished, and he couldn’t help it. He closed the gap between them pulling her into his arms.

“ _Please_ ,” she said again. “We can’t. I can’t.”

“We can run away together,” he told her, inhaling deeply to try to memorize her scent. He had almost forgot what she smelled like. How could he have forgotten? “Now. Tonight. Just you and I on the road.”

With a strangled sob, she pulled away from him taking a few steps backwards and out of his reach.

“No! Alistair, you are King now and I can’t take you from that! I won’t be the reason Ferelden falls into a civil war for the throne.” Tears were streaming down her face. The green cream she wore around her eyes, streaking down her cheeks. She was furious.

He had always loved that eye make-up. She looked so fierce and exotic with it on.

“Anora can rule! Sod Ferelden. Duncan is heir and will be able to take the throne when he’s older! Please. Don’t make me leave you again!”

Her face hardened, the tears stopped, “ _Make you leave me? Make you leave me?”_ she screamed. “I didn’t _make_ you do anything!” She shoved him then, two hands on his chest pushing him backwards quicker then he thought possible. He stumbled. “I wanted nothing more than to be with you!”

“I know!” he roared at her, grabbing her wrists in his hands. “I know, and it kills me every.single.day that I made the wrong choice! I chose wrong, Lana. Wrong! I don’t want to do it again. Leave with me. Please?”

“No.” Her voice was quieter now, fierce, but soft. “Ferelden needs its king.”  There was finality in her tone.

They stood like that for a handful of heartbeats, his hands grasping her wrists, chests heaving in anger and frustration. Alistair stared into her eyes, trying hard to keep his gaze from straying to her mouth. But when he did, when he glanced down, she breathed out, “Maker help me,” before crushing those lips to his.

They made love, fierce and passionate and soft and gentle and over too, too quickly. Again and again they moved together, until at last they fell asleep in the same camp it had started in so long ago.

In the morning she was gone.

The fourth year of his reign, the topic of a Feastday hunt came up and Alistair agreed reluctantly. The woods west of Haven were wonderful hunting grounds and he found himself again on the road to Orzammar.

He should have been surprised to find her there. But he wasn’t.

And so a tradition was born. Once a year, they met in their spot. And pretended that a Blight still raged around them.

Alistair had been king for 18 years now. And he had learned that it was surprisingly easy to fake his own death.

Duncan would make a great King. He would rule fair and just and the Grey Wardens would have his back.

She was there, like he knew she’d be. In the clearing. Eyes glittering through her green make-up. He had asked her once why she wore it.

 

> _“There are two answers to that question,” she told him. “The first is why I started wearing it. The second is why I keep wearing it.”_
> 
> _He nodded at her encouragingly. “You’d like to hear it?” she questioned. “Very well.”_
> 
> _“This cream is made from the leftover dredges of elf-root. When you make a health poultice, you pull out the sap and leave the pulp. You know this. The Keeper once told me that it brought good luck to wear the cream. The spirits would protect you while you wore it.”_
> 
> _“That sounds like a nice story,” he told her, “and why do you keep wearing it?”_
> 
> _“I keep wearing it,” she laughed, “because I find that humans think me exotic and beautiful for it.”_
> 
> _Alistair laughed along with her, “You, my dear, are right.”_

He stared at her across the clearing, eyes taking in every inch of her. A smile broke on his face as she quirked an eyebrow at him.

“I heard you were dead.”

“Yes, tragedy really. Assassinated by an Antivan Crow.”

“Tragic.”

“Very.”

“Duncan is King?”

“Aye. He’ll make a fine one.”

Ten steps was all it took until he had crossed the clearing and took her in his arms. She fit just so. As if she was made for him.

“Please don’t leave me again,” she whispered.

“Never.” 


End file.
